feliz.cumpleanos!

Friday was Claire's second birthday (my little niece), and for a two year old, the birthday party is the icing on the cake. Today we celebrated with my family and the DeShong family (luckily, no rain)!! As opposed to Claire's one year birthday party where I think she only half understood the concept of gifts and the whole idea that the people had joined because of her, this year was a different story. She knew it was her party and that the brightly colored paper contained goddies that were all hers and the sprinkled cupcakes were for her birthday:)!! Here are a few shots that kinda tell the whole story!


looks like she enjoyed the cupcakes...


Little sister LyzaBug was enjoying herself as well. Checkout that hair!!


Yours truly:)!!




And here's a little footage of the big event...

happy.bday.claire-bear!

Today is the day that Claire hits her terrible-two's! Exactly two years ago today, we were all so shocked that she came out a girl, because for some silly reason (well, we'll blame it on the silly old wives tales) we all thought she was going to be a boy and we even referred to the unborn baby in Jess's belly as "Cooper." To everyone's surprise, we heard screams of "it's a girl!!" come out of the delivery room as we were anxiously waiting down the hall to meet her for the very first time.

Miss Claire has become quite an outgoing little girl with a vocabulary almost as big as mine (which isn't huge, but it's amazing for a two year old)!! We are excited to celebrate with her on Sunday! Claire, when mommy or daddy tell you "NO" this week when you want something, remind them that it's your birthweek (that's what I refer to it as since one day isn't nearly long enough).

Happy birthday, Claire-Bear. We love you!


And as a little tease, here's your gift Claire! You can't open it until Sunday!!!

my.assistant!

I absolutely love my job! I get up in the morning, walk Peyton, make coffee, turn on the Today Show and catch-up on my emails. Then it's work work work all day long. I'm either color correcting a shoot or a wedding, meeting with one of my brides or a potential bride, at a shoot, designing an album, canvas or book, or just plain getting caught up on the business side of things. No matter what though, I love it. And none of it would be possible without the help of my furry little assistant, Peyton. I have told Simon several times that I don't know what I'd do without her at home with me!

This is my typical spot during the day if I'm home working. I bought all of this cool office furniture from CB2, but lately I've been downstairs in this spot! So, I wanted to share these with you because none of it would be possible without the endless help of my assistant. She's really great at sleeping on the corner of my laptop while I'm working on your photos. So you can thank her for the input and the end result that you see with your shoot:)!

(Peyton is not currently accepting new clients, so please do not send her any emails!!) ha! Do you all think I'm a complete dork now??!!


Peyton took this shot of me acting stupid:)

NCAA

I've been busy the past two weeks with a commercial shoot for the NCAA. I've started to do some commercial stuff, but I just haven't had time to post the work here. Soon though, I hope to add a new gallery on my website to showcase the work!

Here I was hired to photograph 22 NCAA employees at their downtown Indy national headquarters building. In conjunction with their "faces behind the NCAA" campaign, these photographs will be used for H.R. materials! They've got an awesome building that was designed by Michael Graves. (You may have seen some of his products and designs inTarget. I know he has some small home accessories there). Here are just a few of the hundreds that I shot!

ummm, yeah...

I hate giving sneak peeks because I want you to be excited all at once, but as I was starting my rough edit through the wedding I shot on Friday, I couldn't resist playing with these three images just a little bit. As I mentioned last week, the Mavris is one of my all-time fave venues in Indy, so I couldn't wait to give these images a little vintage/retro look since it totally fits with the style and architecture of the building. This is all you get for now. More to come soon!!!!

the.girls!

I snapped a few shots of my two nieces, Claire and Lyza tonight while at Mellow Mushroom celebrating mom's birthday. Claire has completely latched onto the funny face that I taught her once (and assumed that she'd forget by now-ha, yeah right!). Lyza is as cute as ever with her chubby cheeks and little butt-chin (just like her aunt jamie's!!:))

angie + craig | engaged!

Finally, we had some beautiful weather for Craig & Angie's engagement shoot! We got rained out the week before, but we totally lucked out with the bright blue sky, the light breeze and warm sunshine last weekend. This was the first time that I had met Craig, but he was so easy to get to know. He wasn't shy at all and was up for anything I asked him to do. I am really looking forward to their July wedding! We started off at Monument Circle and then headed to Mass Ave...

We'll start off with one of my favorites:)


Actually, as I was working on editing these images, I did a double-take on my color settings with this shot below. I swear there is no extra saturation done with this photo. How crazy is it that the sky was this blue??!!


Love it!




Ha! I am so glad that Angie and Craig didn't mind doing some of the weird things that I asked of them. Here, I was laying on the ground on my back shooting straight up. I think it's kinda cool!!:)


I like the way the wind is blowing her hair here:)










Again, the sky and water here are crazy. In fact, I think I had to take some green OUT of the shot because it was so bright! Aren't they cute??!!


Craig & Angie, I hope you like everything! I can't wait for July 12th to roll around! Enjoy your slideshow!

happy.birthday.mom!

Tonight we will all be celebrating mom's birthday at one of the best pizza joints on earth, Mellow Mushroom in Carmel (which we actually discovered last year in Destin, Florida. Imagine our delight to learn that a Mellow Mushroom existed in Carmel, Indiana!!!). Anyways, today is the day, and rather than waiting until tonight to give mom her gift, we all decided to break the news to her here! So mom, make sure you ask off from work on Friday November 21st because you, me, Simon, Jess, Brian, Claire, Lyza and Turtle will be going to stay in a cabin in Southern Indiana from Friday through Sunday. If it's nice outside we'll go shopping in Brown County and cookout. If it's cold, we'll put on a fire in the fireplace, play some pool and relax in the hot tub. It's a win-win situation! I hope you like what we all pitched-in and got you. Surprise! See you tonight!

brooke + lauren!

Brooke and Lauren could possibly be the cutest little girls I've ever seen! I am always anxious to meet a new client for the first time because it's really hard to get a true sense for someone through email. But I knew that as soon as they pulled up at the IMA, this shoot was going to be a blast because the girls had obviously had their pictures taken a few times before because they did exactly what I asked! They made my job too easy!

It was fun to watch Brooke and Lauren interact because Lauren (the little one) followed Brooke and did just what she did. If Brooke stood still for me and put her hands on her hips, so did Lauren:) These girls were great!

Meet the gorgeous, Brooke!

...and her cutie-patootie little sis, Lauren!

I love how fun this shot is!!!







Checkout Brooke's pose. It's got a little attitude and I LIKE it!

Such cuties...





We tormented a squirrel for a minute:)



Here's a good lookin' family!


Brooke slipped on her tap shoes and recital outfit for a quick performance! How adorable!



Jeremy and Christy, thanks so much for allowing me to photograph your girls. They are beautiful and I can only hope that I get to shoot for you guys again! I hope you love your photos! Enjoy your show!!:)